Shopping carts, also known as shopping trolleys in certain countries, are ubiquitous implements in many types of retailers, particularly grocery stores. Shopping carts are typically provided to customers by retail establishments to increase the customers' convenience and encourage return shopping visits and increased shopping activity. Carts may typically have four or more wheels. Many carts have swivel wheels at the front and non-swiveling rear wheels. Other carts have four swiveling wheels.
Over time and/or due to damage, wheels on carts may become stuck so that they exhibit increased spinning or swiveling resistance. Additionally, damaged swiveling wheels may develop wobble, which generally defined as sustained oscillation of the swiveling wheels. Such damage or defects may increase the amount of effort expended by a person trying to push or pull the cart. A cart with such damage or defects may have a tendency to veer to one side or may not easily turn in one or both directions. Such problematic carts may cause user frustration and decrease user comfort, which can discourage customers from returning to the establishment.
What is needed, therefore, is a system for identifying carts that exhibit symptoms of damaged or defective wheels and for notifying an associate to remove from circulation and potentially remove or replace the problematic carts.
Corresponding reference characters indicate corresponding components throughout the several views of the drawings. Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of various embodiments of the present disclosure. Also, common but well-understood elements that are useful or necessary in a commercially feasible embodiment are often not depicted in order to facilitate a less obstructed view of these various embodiments of the present disclosure.